This is a juvenile specimen belonging to the family Lumbricidae. Without a clitellum it cannot be identified to species.

Good point André van Eck . I presumed that it is from Tunis.

Dear Professor Csaba, thank you very much for your kind response. I will look for adult specimens and I will send you photos.

Dear Professor André,

Thank you for your reply, this specimen was collected from the north of Tunisia during march 2021.

Yes it is similar at the first glance to an Ap. caliginosa species complex specimen, but there are similar species in Tunis as well, like Allolobophora festae (sometimes Prosellodrilus or Helodrilus). It is a bit smaller though (ca. 50 mm).

Was this specimen collected with any other specimens? That would give you a clue.

Lamia Medini

[email protected]

Have you tried this contact?

Dear professor John, thank you very much for the contact, I will contact her.

Dear all,

These are photos of an adult specimen. Thank you in advance.

Dear Abdili

Send me the adult pic of this earthworm specially clitellar region and pic from ventral side.I will confirm this species, If it is A. caliginosa,

Dear Abdili:

We reported both caliginosa and festae from Tunisia. See

Medini-Bouaziz, L., R. Ben Ali, M. Limem and J.W. Reynolds. 2020. Preliminary key to Tunisian megadriles (Annelida, Clitellata, Oligochaeta), based on external characters, insofar as possible. Megadrilogica 25(12): 131–141. (available on ResearchGate)

It can be difficult to identify earthworm species from photographs, particularly in some complexes and closely related species.

A ventrolateral pic of the new adult specimen would be better, but I do not think that this is A. festae.

Dear Abdili,

You can peruse this scientific publication for your earthworm species identification: Baker, G., and Barrett, V., 1994. Earthworm Identifier. Publication of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research Organization. CSIRO Publishing Australia.

That source is probably out dated!

Moreover, it was published in Australia so might be it is not appropriate for native Tunisian worms.

Good point Csaba.

Which segments between is Clitellum on? I don't see the clitellum because of the blurry front of the photo.